Page 121 of The Scarlet Alchemist

The prince fell to his elbows, blood dribbling past his purple lips, veins a stark blue against the papery shade of his skin.

I thought that I knew death well. I had waded into its thorny waters and plucked souls from its jagged teeth. I’d been chewed to pieces by death and spit back out on the streets of Chang’an. I knew the stages of decay the way scholars knew the words of philosophers. Death was not supposed to scare me.

But as the prince wilted into the ocean of his own blood, already a quiet echo of himself, I realized that no one could really know death. The hundreds of bodies I’d handled could never have prepared me for the look in the prince’s eyes when he died, the moment he went from seeing only me to seeing nothing at all, the moment he went from someone I loved to nothing more than a corpse.

I’ve never done anything that mattered, he’d said.

You mattered tome,I thought.

My arms shook as the Empress drew closer, her heavy footsteps like a death knell as she crossed the room, then kneeled in front of my cage. She swiped a finger across the blood on her chest, grimacing. It pooled down the front of her golden dress, dribbling onto the floor.

“There was no need for that, silly girl,” she said. “You’re only delaying the inevitable.”

I surged closer, swiping a hand through the bars, but the Empress only leaned back a breath, just past my fingertips.

“His organs are intact,” she said. “I didn’t even touch his pretty face. I’ll let you resurrect him while he’s still warm. You just have to work with me, Scarlet.”

I bit my lip, my head hanging low. Surely the Empress would chain me in the dungeon for the rest of my life, force me to spend my days making gold for her.

But the prince could live.

I didn’t know now how we could defeat her, but with both of us alive, maybe we could try. As long as we lived, we had choices, we had a chance. I looked over her shoulder at the prince spilled across the stairs and thought of him memorizing every part of me, squeezing my hand and knowing my heart even when I didn’t know it myself.

But if I refused, and no one made gold for the Empress, then she would eventually die. I could end her reign if it meant losing everyone that I loved.

Tears splashed onto the floor of the cage. Hadn’t I given enough?

You know that there’s a price for change, and the people who have the most power never want to pay it, I’d said to the Moon Alchemist. Surely no one in the history of the empire had ever held as much leverage over the Empress as I did in this moment. But even now, I didn’t want to pay the price either. I wanted to be a child who looked to her elders and teachers and government to hold the world together. I wanted to run home to Auntie and Uncle and cry because none of this was supposed to be my job. I’d never asked for this.

But someone had to pay.

You cannot create good without also creating evil.That was the most important rule of alchemy—that behind everything beautiful was a hungry shadow. I had thought everyone else cowards for not being willing to make sacrifices, but in truth I hadn’t known the depths of what I was asking.

It didn’t matter if it was me, or the prince, or the children burning in pyres, or old man Gou. There was always a reason to sayIt’s not my fault. Why should I have to pay?But if no one paid, this would never end.

Say the words, Zilan, I thought.Look the Empress in the eyes and say,Let the prince die. I will never help you.

That was all I had to do, and the Empress’s reign would end. The insatiable rich would wither and die.

I pressed my forehead to the bars, slumping boneless against them, letting out a croaked sound of despair. I saw my reflection in the dark puddle of the Empress’s blood, the dirty pearls, the singed remnants of golden thread.

“Don’t cry, my perfect little alchemist,” the Empress said. “Just say the word, and you can leave the cage.”

My hand slipped down, splashing in the shockingly warm liquid. I lifted it back up, watching the Empress’s blood run down my wrist. I almost laughed at the irony—this was what I was supposed to give the other alchemists, and I had plenty of it now, far too late.

“Say the word, Scarlet.”

Say it, Zilan.

My whole body shook, my fingers rolling over broken pearls.

“Hurry, while he’s still warm.”

Tell her, Zilan.

I whispered my answer, the words like jagged chunks of ice.

“Speak up, Scarlet,” the Empress said.

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